


1,500 miles

by nymja



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, I have a lot of feelings, Roadtrip, Sandad, Take your daughter to murder month, spoilers for 8x5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2020-03-02 19:46:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18817759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nymja/pseuds/nymja
Summary: There's 1,500 miles between Winterfell and King's Landing.--“You still got your stupid little list of names, then?”“Yes.”“Half the bloody kingdom’s dead. Who the fuck’s left?”“Cersei.”“You got bigger balls than a bull.”“Thanks.”





	1,500 miles

**Author's Note:**

> i have a lot of feelings about these two

**Day One.**

There’s 1,500 miles between them and King’s Landing. He bites down on an apple as he rides, sending her a side glance.

“Can still turn around,” he comments.

“Fuck off,” she replies, looking ahead.

He raises his eyebrows, takes another bite of apple. “Suit yourself.”

 

**Day Three.**

They stop at an inn because his balls have retreated into his fucking stomach and he’s tired of pissing in the snow. Arya wordlessly drops coins onto the counter in a way that speaks to little rich girl, and then they sit at a long table. They get looks, him more so than her. He always gets looks. That’s what happens when half your face is burned off.

A serving girl drops off two bowls of meat and two tankards of ale. 

She raises an eyebrow from her seat across from him. “Really?”

“What.”

“Chicken.”

Sandor glares as he picks a tiny sliver of bone out of his teeth. “What’s it matter? All tastes like goat shit.”

She lets out a short scoff, then tears off a leg and bites down.

 

**Day Five.**

“You still got your stupid little list of names, then?”

“Yes.”

“Half the bloody kingdom’s dead. Who the fuck’s left?”

“Cersei.”

“You got bigger balls than a bull.”

“Thanks.”

 

**Day Six.**

They’re leading the horses to water when she speaks for the first time in a few hours.

“You think you’ll like it?”

“Like what?”

“Killing him.”

He doesn’t answer right away, patting the side of his horse’s neck as it bends down to drink. Would he like it? Sandor remembers what it meant to cower like a kicked dog. Remembers the face of his brother as his hand wrapped around his head, shoving it down.

“Like’s got nothing to do with it,” he states. “Dead’s dead, that’s what matters.”

Arya stares at her horse, looking thoughtful. It’s a few minutes before she speaks.

“I think I’ll very much like killing Cersei.”

“‘Course you will.” He fills a skin of water, tosses it to her. “You sick little fuck.”

 

**Day Eight.**

It’s finally getting warm enough for them to camp. She hunts for game as he starts fire and tends to the horses. Two hours later the sun’s setting and they’re eating fucking squirrels.

“And you give me shit for chicken,” he mutters. The meat is gamey as all hell, and there’s too many little bones.

“It’s what was around.”

“Bring back some bloody rocks next time. Rather chew on that.”

“Piss off.”

“Hunt better.”

After they’re done eating, he lays by the fire, one of his elbows propping him up into a lean. Across from, Arya sits, her elbows on her knees and thoughts somewhere else. She’s a right shit, but that doesn’t stop him from noticing she’s young. Not that it matters, out here. No one’s young in Westeros.

Sandor’s face screws into a frown. His thoughts drift to that stupid twat in Winterfell. Who just wanted to  _ thank  _ Arya fucking Stark. Sandor doesn’t need to know anything about that, where it went, where it didn’t went. 

But it’s fucking boring out here. So he asks.

“Whatever happened to staying away from miserable old shits?”

She doesn’t even look up. “Miserable old shit, now.”

He lifts his eyebrows, her point made. “Miserable old shit, then.”

Fucking Beric Dondarrion. His corpse had been heavy as hell lifting onto that shit pyre. If he were still alive, he’d probably gotten off on it, what with his hard-on for fire.

He’d died for her. Sandor didn’t realize until after it was over that that’s what he was doing, too. He was just a little faster, is all.

“I thought that was our last night alive,” she says flatly. “It’s different.”

“Fucking  _ how _ ?”

She glances up at that. “What do you mean,  _ how _ ?”

Sandor gestures around. “Bear could be out there. One of your fucking wolves. Rapers.” He tilts his head. “A fucking cough. Any of it could be your last night alive.”

He watches as she shifts, as her hands fold in front of her. Arya’s not the same girl she was before she left him to die, but he can still tell when she’s uncomfortable.

“It’s different,” she repeats, quieter this time.

 

**Day 10.**

They have to kill a few men in the morning. There’s little fanfare about it-- just his sword, her stupid little toothpick. The sun rises, and seven fucks are dead.

He presses his foot against one of the men’s backs to pull his sword out of him. It slides and he frowns as he wipes the blood off on the dead man’s tunic. 

“How many you get?” He calls out.

“Three.”

“So that’s, what? Seventeen for me, eleven for you?”

“Mine were harder to kill.”

He gestures to the dead men on the ground. “Doesn’t matter to them.”

Arya’s face remains flat as she stares at him and pointedly sheaths her small, little sword. 

“It’s just six more,” she says coolly, hoping back on her horse.

“Seven,” he corrects.

 

**Day Twelve.**

“Bet it’s not as fun anymore, is it?”

They’re both on bedrolls, staring up at the stars.

“What isn’t?”

“Your list. Haven’t even said it anymore. One day you won’t be able to say it at all.”

She’s quiet.

“Listen to me, girl,” Sandor says, suddenly feeling tired. “It never gets better.”

Arya rolls onto her side, facing away from him as she pulls a blanket over her shoulder.

 

**Day Fifteen.**

They’re passing an inn when Arya’s horse pulls into a stop.

“What?” He barks over his shoulder.

She’s staring at a sign. “I want to stop here.”

He looks at the inn again, eyes squinting. Then it clicks. “See your little fat friend?”

Arya’s eyes widen. “You remember that?”

“Think I’m a fucking moron?”

“Yes.”

“Bitch.”

They both tie their horses.

\--

“Arry!” The baker says, wiping his hands on an apron as he comes out from behind a kitchen. “They said you were here, and-”

Sandor stares down at him, unimpressed. The baker’s eyes widen in recognition.

“-and I’ll go get you supper,” he says.

The baker, Hot Pie because why the fuck not, and Arya sit. He gives her bread shaped like a wolf, and when he leaves Sandor snorts.

Arya frowns at him. “What?”

“All your stupid friends.” He shakes his head. “ _ Thanking  _ you all the time.”

“Thanking me for what?”

Sandor watches as the boy drops an entire tray of ale. 

“Hopefully not the same thing.” He grabs her bread and bites the head off it.

 

**Day Sixteen.**

“Why don’t you just turn around?” He asks, annoyed.

Arya glares at him. He glares back.

“Or keep on whingeing.”

“I’m not whingeing.”

“Fine. Sulking.”

“What are you talking about?”

He sighs, looking up. “Go back to that inn. Or Winterfell. Or the fucking Vale.”

Sandor half expects her to tell him to fuck off again. When all she does is frown, then snap her reins, that’s when he realizes that’s what she actually wants to do.

“Fuck,” he mutters to himself.

 

**Day Nineteen.**

They swap their furs for leathers. King’s Landing gets closer by the day.

And Sandor has something eating at him. Taking small little bites, all up and down his skin. He doesn’t know what it is, only that he looks at Arya and her stupid little sword and her tired horse and it makes him frown more often than not.

“He ever find you?” He asks, and wonders why the fuck he’s asking.

“Who?”

“The twat with the hammer.”

She tenses, the hand sharpening her sword stilling. Her words are carefully flat. “You mean Gendry.”

“Is there another twat with a hammer?”

Arya looks up. “What do you mean, find?”

“At the feast. Bloody moron was wandering up and down the hall like he’d forgotten how to walk.” He raises his brows. “ _ Mooning _ .”

She visibly swallows, then looks down at her sword again.

Sandor leans against a tree, watching her expression, her body language. And he sighs.

“What’d you do to that poor fuck?”

The whetstone makes a long, scraping sound.

“He found me,” is all she offers. 

 

**Day 20.**

He sees more and more of those Southern birds. It won’t be long, now, until they reach where they’re heading.

Sandor can’t stop that gnawing feeling. “Your sister’s probably wondering where you are.”

“She’ll figure it out.”

He grinds his teeth together. “Or that crippled god boy you were all so fucking concerned over.”

“...he probably already knows,” Arya says, and for a moment he sees discomfort on her face.

“That bastard brother of yours, then. Or the bastard you’re fuck-”

“I know what you’re doing,” she cuts in calmly. Arya narrows her eyes. “What I can’t figure out is why you’re doing it.”

He doesn’t fucking know, either. 

They stare at each other for awhile, at a standstill. Tension between them.

“This is what you’re doing, then?” He finally asks.

There’s a few seconds of hesitation, but she nods.

“Yeah,” she states quietly. “This is what I’m doing.”

Sandor frowns. Then he nods.

“Then stop being so slow. Or the mad dragon bitch will get to her first.”

Arya doesn’t look relieved. But she moves her horse into a gallop, and he can’t do nothing else but follow after.

 

**Day 23.**

They’re a day out from the city. She doesn’t want to stop, but he makes her. 

“So,” he begins, speaking while chewing with his mouth open. She got rabbit tonight. Better than fucking squirrel.  “You kill the queen. Then what?”

“There isn’t a then.”

He snorts. “You don’t plan to outlive a Lannister cunt?”

Arya’s eyebrows draw down, so he presses.

“You kill her. Her people kill you. Sounds like a draw.” He spits out a bone. “Does it count if it’s a draw?”

Arya takes a long drink of wine, passing it to him as she rubs the back of her arm across her mouth. “Dead is dead, right?”

Sandor brings the wineskin up. “Dead is dead,” he agrees, tilting his head back and emptying it out.

 

**Day 24.**

“How many you get?” He asks, stabbing one that’s still kicking through the neck.

“Five.”

“27 and 27,” he notes. 

“Guess that makes us even.”

“Guess it does.”

 

**Day 25.**

He wakes before she does. It’s still too early for the sun, and so he just watches her. She curls into a ball when she sleeps, like she’s trying to make herself a small target. There’s no whimpering, no kicking out. Arya’s trained herself better than that. It makes the stillness of it all more noticeable. 

His throat works. 

Then he throws her pack at her head. She’s up just before it connects, grabbing it before she’s even fully awake.

“Get your shit,” he orders. “You’ve got a queen to kill.”

 

**Day 26.**

“Sandor.”

He hasn’t heard his name in so long that that alone is enough to make him stop. So stop he does, looking over his shoulder.

Arya stares at him, lips parted and fear in her eyes. “Thank you.”

He takes a long breath. The gnawing feeling is gone. 

He can’t find anything to say, and so he doesn’t. His hand goes to the hilt of his sword and he makes himself move.

Dead is dead, after all. 


End file.
